The co-founders of Samourai Wallet, a cryptocurrency mixing service that facilitated over $237 million in illegal transactions, have been sentenced to prison following their conviction on money laundering and conspiracy charges.
Keonne Rodriguez, 37, the Chief Executive Officer, received a five-year prison sentence on November 6, 2025, while William Lonergan Hill, 67, the Chief Technology Officer, was sentenced to four years in prison on November 19, 2025.
The case represents a significant enforcement action against cryptocurrency money-laundering infrastructure, with prosecutors emphasizing that the technology type is irrelevant for criminal consequences.
U.S. Attorney Nicolas Roos stated that “the sentences reflect the harmful impact that money laundering services have on victims by making it virtually impossible for victims to recover their stolen funds.”
Beginning around 2015, Rodriguez and Hill engineered Samourai as a mobile application specifically designed to obfuscate the origins of illicit cryptocurrency transactions.
The platform featured two primary services: Whirlpool and Ricochet.
Whirlpool operated as a Bitcoin mixing service that coordinated batches of cryptocurrency exchanges between groups of users, deliberately obscuring the original source of Bitcoin holdings within the blockchain’s transactional record.
This prevented law enforcement and cryptocurrency exchanges from tracing funds to their origins. Ricochet enabled users to introduce unnecessary intermediate transactions known as “hops” between sending and receiving addresses, further complicating forensic analysis.
The scale proved substantial: from Ricochet’s 2017 launch and Whirlpool’s 2019 inception, more than 80,000 Bitcoin valued at over $2 billion at the time passed through these services. Samourai collected approximately $6 million in fees from these operations.
Evidence presented during prosecution revealed that Rodriguez and Hill actively marketed Samourai to criminal users and encouraged illicit activity.
Hill promoted Samourai on Dread, a darknet forum dedicated to illegal marketplace discussions, specifically recommending Whirlpool as “a much better option” for “cleaning dirty BTC” and making cryptocurrency “untraceable” and “clean.”
Rodriguez demonstrated equally culpable conduct, personally engaging in a Twitter exchange encouraging cryptocurrency exchange hackers to route their proceeds through Samourai’s Whirlpool service.
When hackers ultimately used a competing mixing service, both defendants expressed disappointment.
Internal communications confirmed their knowledge of the service’s criminal purpose. In a WhatsApp exchange, Rodriguez explicitly described mixing as “money laundering for bitcoin.”
Marketing materials acknowledged that customers would include “Dark/Grey Market participants” moving proceeds from “illicit activity.”
Criminal Proceeds and Sentencing Details
The $237 million in laundered proceeds originated from diverse criminal enterprises including drug trafficking, darknet marketplaces, cyber-intrusions, frauds, sanctioned jurisdictions, murder-for-hire schemes, and child pornography website operations.
Beyond prison sentences, U.S. District Judge Denise L. Cote ordered both defendants to serve three years of supervised release and pay $250,000 in fines.
Rodriguez and Hill have spent $6,367,139.69 in forfeiture, representing Samourai’s earned fees, toward the total $237,832,360.55 forfeiture order.
The investigation involved substantial international cooperation, including assistance from the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation, FBI, Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs, Europol, Portuguese Judicial Police, Icelandic Police, and FBI Pittsburgh Field Office. Hill’s July 2024 extradition from Portugal proved critical to prosecution.
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